When creating an Integrated Circuit (“IC”) design using EDA software, designers may use predetermined manufacturer-supplied components in a Process Design Kit (“PDK”) to create a design. A subset of the PDK is a Component Description Format (“CDF”) information set. A CDF describes attributes of individual components and libraries of components in the PDK, as one aspect of EDA software. A CDF may be attached to either a cell or a library of components. A CDF attached to a cell may describe the parameters and attributes for that one particular component. A CDF attached to a library may describe the parameters and attributes for all the components in the library. CDF information is often stored in one or more files which are referenced by/included within a PDK. Different EDA software companies may support their own version of a CDF, though by a different name, and perhaps with different characteristics. For example, Cadence has its own proprietary CDF, Open PDK has its own version of a CDF, and iPDK has its own version of the CDF called iCDF. These CDFs are only provided as examples, and are not meant to be an exhaustive list of all the different CDFs. Additionally, other CDFs may be developed in the future. One of ordinary skill in the art will be able to determine whether a certain information set is a CDF. For convenience in this description, “CDF” will refer to any information set that is used to describe components, cells, library of components, or library of cells.
Currently, EDA software manages component parameters by providing a Graphical User Interface (“GUI”) which lists all the parameters of a selected component in a scrollable window. As semiconductor manufacturing processes have moved to ever-smaller geometries, the number of parameters relating to a particular semiconductor component has increased. For example, a component based on a 28 nm manufacturing process may have 300 parameters. The number of parameters will only increase as manufacturing processes move to ever smaller geometries. It is cumbersome for someone to identify, set, and/or inspect parameters for a particular component when there are hundreds of parameters to sift through.
For example, because there are so many parameters, all the parameters cannot be listed in an easily ascertainable fashion. Currently, as explained above, applications provide users with a scroll bar to help navigate the list. However, it has become cumbersome and time consuming for a user to scroll through all the parameters now that there are hundreds of parameters for a component.
Additionally, different PDK's—PDKs from different manufacturers and/or PDKs representing different process generations—may use widely different terminology, nomenclature, and/or case sensitivity for a given property or group of properties. This further increases the cognitive burden on an IC designer/user when dealing with multiple PDKs or switching from one manufacturing process (or generation) to another. The designer must struggle to remember the different nomenclatures when manually scrolling through large numbers of parameter to find a specific parameter or group of parameters.
As a result, it would be desirable to provide a method and system to simplify these actions as well as provide a better parameter management system.